Posts Tagged ‘tarping’

Tom DesLonchamp is the filmmaker, RISD graduate, video game developer and swashbuckling daredevil who’s most recently responsible for an almost overwhelmingly endearing animated Jookabox music video. But that’s not all. DesLongchamp is a multi-disciplinary whiz kid. He’s generated a wide gamut of rapturously kinetic artwork, from the childhood cartoon pastiche of his short film Kid Show to a bizarre counter-documentary study of domesticated cats entitled About Dogs.

Browsing through his website is almost exhilarating, as you stumble onto unexpected creative endeavors like a visual Facebook diary and an informative animation about dental hygiene. Regardless of the medium or the subject, DesLongchamp seems to take an effervescent, fearless approach to life. While his devil may care attitude may have landed him in the hospital once or twice (due to tarping-related injuries), it’s also taken him to excitingly fresh creative ground. Check out our interview with Tom below.

How did you end up making the video for “You Cried Me”? What got you into Jookabox, and where did the concept for the video come from?

Last year I was introduced to Michael Kaufmann, who does A&R/Development for Asthmatic Kitty Records. He gave me Jookabox’s album Ropechain to listen to for game or music video ideas. I listened to the album a lot and became very familiar with its themes. I ended up creating a flash video game for the track “Girl Ain’t Preggers.” Almost a year later, Michael contacted me about doing something new for Jookabox’s new album, Dead Zone Boys. I listened to it and “You Cried Me” struck me with its energy. The song automatically conjured gestures of movement in my mind–not entirely specific to characters or images. The essence was something like a “let’s get the hell out of here” kind of feeling. I just held onto that emotion and started drawing ghosts. It was exciting to dive into a spooky theme, since it contrasted so much with my last animation, Kid Show.